


To be human

by orphan_account



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Dimitri is severely mentally ill, Dissociation, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, hand holding, tender touches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-22
Updated: 2019-08-22
Packaged: 2020-09-24 09:28:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20356222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The war is over, and Dimitri has won, now reunited with Claude after so many years .Except the war is still raging within Dimitri.





	To be human

The first time it happens, he offers to make him coffee . They always boiled it back at home, slow and warm, watching the foam bubble up and the steam filling the room with a rich and elegant scent of coffee . 

Dimitri takes one look at the coffee slowly brewing and grunts .

" Thanks, I don't want stew for breakfast," he murmurs, and his eye is full of poison .

Claude looks genuinely hurt for a moment - but he gathers the pieces of his decency from the floor and softly nods.   
" As you wish," he smiles . 

Dimitri just grunts , and his eye turns glassy and disoriented again .

The next time , Dimitri accidentally steps on his cape and tears it at the hem , grumbling something small and angry as he looks at the tear .

" I can mend it for you," Claude offers ." Marianne taught me how !"

Dimitri offers him the coldest of looks .  
" It's none of your business . What are you, a handmaiden?"

Claude flinches at that - people in Fodlan had called him far too many slurs at his youth for liking men , and even though he was never beaten into submission, a small part of his heart still ached .

" ... I just wanted to help," he murmurs , and Dimitri leaps at the chance to bite back , for Claude was finally playing the game with him .

" You don't have to act nice, you know . Faerghus is already siding with Leicester."

Claude almost replies, but Lorenz tugs at his sleeve discreetly .  
" A moment?" He murmurs , and so the quarrel is resolved before it even starts. 

And it keeps on happening . More and more often, even on a daily basis, and Claude seems to have become Dimitri's punching bag, and he's very much not appreciating it - alliances be damned. It's always Lorenz or Hilda and Dedue that tear them away from each other , they've even grown close to each other because of that... How bittersweet.

Until they're in the library together, and they're alone . Somehow, they've snuck away from their vassals . 

Claude watches Dimitri read , yet he might as well staring at a wall with how lost his eye seems to be . Claude fetches a book on chess ( Hilda and her skill be damned ) and Dimitri, almost like clockwork, glances up at it with a disapproving scowl . He's been reading the same page for five minutes now - he still doesn't know what the book is about . He can read the words, but he's too tired to piece them together or decipher their meanings . 

" Fodlan is in shambles, and you're reading about a game?" He grunts . At least Claude knows what he's reading, he thinks to himself. " Some time management you got ."

Claude sighs , but he remains calm .  
" A distraction is good every once in awhile, you know !" He puts on his best teasing smile .   
" Otherwise my brain will become fried mush."

" I could say it already has ," Dimitri mumbles almost inaudibly, and Claude lets out this exasperated sigh before he sets the book to the side. 

" Please, speak to me in a better tone," Claude murmurs, " just as I'm trying to .'

" I'm only pointing out your shortcomings," Dimitri says, his voice louder and clearer now . His eye shines - it's no longer that mess of fog and glass anymore . 

" ... Why are you doing this?" Claude murmurs , his eyes honestly and deeply pained . 

" I'd rather have Faerghus be associated with actual politicians instead of louts who happened to be Counts . " He smiles, a small, sadistic smile that holds no joy .

" Dimitri..." He murmurs , and he reaches to touch his shoulder gently, except Dimitri slaps his hand away. Something intense rushes through his whole body, something that makes his skin tingle in an intoxicating way . It's not clean, but it's exhilarating.

" Dimitri!" He snaps , and Dimitri smiles wide, showing teeth too small to be a lion's .

" Keep it down . "

" No," he gasps . " I've kept it down long enough!"

"... Then come at me," Dimitri snarls, joyous like a child finally given what it wants . 

" ... We used to be friends," is what Claude does instead of swinging at him like Dimitri wants him to, and it's clearly something Dimitri hadn't accounted for, if his expression is any indication. He recovers his cynical façade soon enough, but they've both seen it . They both know what's underneath .

" ... So you say," Dimitri huffs in dismissal.

" No, I know it," Claude retorts, voice firm and calm . Just what Dimitri isn't.  
" We were friends . We'd drink tea and spar together and we even snuck into the Goddess Tower once, even though we weren't lovers , just because you wanted to see what it looked like... That was friendship, Dimitri, and you know it." 

" If you think -"

" No, let me speak . I'm still speaking . " He sighs, and he looks at him with teary eyes .  
" Why are you doing this?" He whispers once again, and he is not shielded by a mask of snark and beauty anymore, he is merely Claude, weak and honest . 

" I'm only-" Dimitri tries to use an excuse .

" I'm being honest with you, so why aren't you being honest with me?" Claude gasps , voice louder, almost a desperate sob . 

Dimitri gulps .

Dimitri stares .

Dimitri stays still, and he takes the poison out of his voice . 

" Leave," he whispers, his voice a soft, broken rasp .

" No . I'm not leaving until you answer my question," Claude retorts , except he senses the change within Dimitri. He sits down next to him . 

" ... This would've been so much easier if we just beat each other up..." Dimitri murmurs . 

" I don't care," comes Claude's reply. " Some things aren't meant to be easy .

" ... I thought that m-maybe..." He whispers, and he's shaking now ." You'd end up beating me up . I'd let you ."

" Beat you up?" He gasps . " Wh-"

" ... I don't feel things anymore," he whispers, and Claude finally hushes. " Hell, I haven't tasted shit since I was , what, ten? " He hugs himself, and it must be the saddest thing Claude has ever seen.  
" ... Ever since that day, everything hurt so much... It's like being in a beehive . The bees buzz and they will hurt you, but after a while, you get used to it , the buzzing quiets down, as does the pain...and you go from too much to absolutely nothing . I thought that hurting... That hurting would make me feel real again."

" Dimitri..."

" Please," he whispers. " ... I just want to feel something . To feel real again. I can only feel pain anymore..."

And Claude takes his glove off and takes Dimitri's hand, earning a shocked gasp from him . 

" What are you..."

" Feel my hand," he whispers, gently squeezing it. 

Dimitri nods, almost straining to feel it, but his hands squeezes back timidly .

" Can you feel it?" Claude whispers, bringing it up to cup Dimitri's face so he's touching his skin .

Dimitri nods, almost like a child .  
" It's... warm," he whispers, leaning into it.

"And ? And what else?" He asks , voice soft and encouraging . " Can you tell me?"

" It's...soft..." He whispers ." And it smells like honeysuckle and lemon , a-and..." He chokes on a sob .  
" And it's real ."

Claude wipes the tears from his crying eye with his other hand , also ungloved .

" It is, isn't it? You feel it, don't you?"

Dimitri nods, his bottom lip quivering.

" ... Pain isn't the only thing that makes us feel alive . Love is just as strong, Mitya, if not stronger..." His kind hands wipe his damp cheeks , and Dimitri whimpers . Claude stands up to kiss his forehead tenderly , running hands through his hair .

" Take me to bed..." Dimitri murmurs, still lost and unsure.

" No," Claude shakes his head, as he helps him stand up. " What you need is a good hug ."

" But you said you loved..."

" Love is so much more than sex," he readily responds, and he reaches to take Dimitri's hand . 

" I d-don't know..." Dimitri whimpers . " Can you show me?"

" I'll show you," Claude whispers, placing a soft kiss on his palm .  
" How does a walk on the Goddess Tower to calm you down sound ? "

" A-As..."

" As lovers ."

" ... I'd like that."


End file.
